Obama's ego keeps getting in the way of politics

A trenchant piece of analysis in WaPo by Michael Gerson this morning regarding President Obama's monumental ego where even a slam dunk like extending the Bush tax rates is botched.

Gerson echoes what many on the right have been saying about Obama for years; it doesn't matter what the issue is, it's all about him:

It is the president's favorite rhetorical pose: the hectorer in chief. He is alternately defiant, defensive, exasperated, resentful, harsh, scolding, prickly. He is both the smartest kid in class and the schoolyard bully.

There are many problems with this mode of presidential communication, but mainly its supreme self-regard. The tax deal, in Obama's presentation, was not about the economy or the country. It was about him. It was about the absurd concessions he was forced to make, the absurd opposition he was forced to endure, the universally insufficient deference to his wisdom.

The administration further complicated its communications task by presenting Obama as ideologically superior to his own agreement. The upper-income tax rates and the estate tax provisions, in David Axelrod's description, are "odious." As a rule, staffers should not use such a word to describe policies a president has agreed to accept. It makes a president look compromised and weak. Instead of a leader brokering a popular agreement, Obama appears to be a politician forced under threat to violate his deepest convictions.

Once you start a list, and the evidence is right before your eyes, it is truly shocking to realize how much of an incompetent politician Obama really is. Forget his missteps as a statesman or as chief executive. This aspect of the Obama's failure is much more damning because it is directly linked to his ability to get things done.

And in that department, he is found wanting.

Hat Tip: Ed Lasky

A trenchant piece of analysis in WaPo by Michael Gerson this morning regarding President Obama's monumental ego where even a slam dunk like extending the Bush tax rates is botched.

Gerson echoes what many on the right have been saying about Obama for years; it doesn't matter what the issue is, it's all about him:

It is the president's favorite rhetorical pose: the hectorer in chief. He is alternately defiant, defensive, exasperated, resentful, harsh, scolding, prickly. He is both the smartest kid in class and the schoolyard bully.

There are many problems with this mode of presidential communication, but mainly its supreme self-regard. The tax deal, in Obama's presentation, was not about the economy or the country. It was about him. It was about the absurd concessions he was forced to make, the absurd opposition he was forced to endure, the universally insufficient deference to his wisdom.

The administration further complicated its communications task by presenting Obama as ideologically superior to his own agreement. The upper-income tax rates and the estate tax provisions, in David Axelrod's description, are "odious." As a rule, staffers should not use such a word to describe policies a president has agreed to accept. It makes a president look compromised and weak. Instead of a leader brokering a popular agreement, Obama appears to be a politician forced under threat to violate his deepest convictions.

Once you start a list, and the evidence is right before your eyes, it is truly shocking to realize how much of an incompetent politician Obama really is. Forget his missteps as a statesman or as chief executive. This aspect of the Obama's failure is much more damning because it is directly linked to his ability to get things done.